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Before this thread goes too far into the broader topic of violence/non-violence, please keep the discussion in this thread explicitly pertinent to aikido. If you wish to move to a discussion with a larger scope, please start a new thread in the Open Discussions forum.

i've always wondered about the Healing Sword. What does that concept mean? How does a sword heal?

Kevin
The most common description I have read is that of saving life or preserving it. Again though it denotes violence.
Kill one (presumably evil) person to save many.
Draeger assigns it (I believe to Otake Sensei) to "Kill one, to save ten thousand."
Take take the drama and Sam-U-eye stuff out of it and the concept applies to your job or any cop walking the beat.
Hope that helps.

Even the idea of love that was bandied about in many earlier cultures people misunderstand. Ueshiba trained assassins. Many times when those guys talked about love it also entailed discipline, sacrifice, or killing to preserve family, village and clan. Aikido's history and it's birth was not through the type of peace some people in Aikido think it means.

This peacnic stuff was nonsensical to them, to most anyone who lives in the real world and nonsense to many in the art of aikido. It is typically offered by those who live, protected by those who will do violence on their behalf; Police, Judges, and the military, so they can live in a civil society. Mankind will always live under peace through strength. In the very few cases were non-violent protest succeeded, it was because those in power capitulated.
Mercy belongs to the victor. Anyone thinking they can stop real aggression- through aikido waza- without aggression is simply kidding themselves. Instead people "play" together nicely in a dojo with their budo get-ups, with attacks deviod of real agression, with defense that hardly needs to be of any real use.
And Aikido is not alone in that.
Dan

"The history of peacemaking far outstrips the history of wars by number and victory. Those who do not see this do not see what Ueshiba was saying either in my opinion. But then again how can many understand such enlightened views when they are not. "

Please explain this further and quantify it, because I really do not understand it. I see it the other way around. the Majority of peacemaking situations have followed periods of war and the war certainly influenced and dictated the terms of peace and reconciliation.

Exactly.
I'm also shocked at how he claims that he's enlightened, and so understands what O'sensei said.

It was born from his enlightenment. what were the experiences that led to his enlightenment?

The story of Buddha is clear. How did he reach his enlightenment? what was the main force that drove him to head down the path?

How about Jesus? What were the experiences he had that led him to take the actions he took?

I see a common thread among all great persons. Oh...Ghandi too? Mother Teresa?

The story of Buddha is clear, he entered various ascetic practices. In my view he thought that Aikido would be a perfect vehicle to practice such spiritual disciplines. Maybe similar to the original shaolin concept, but I don't know that for sure.

I don't believe Hitler was a bully that was crying out to have someone stop him.

All good diplomacy has been backed by a strong infrastructure to include military power or the will of the people. You could call this the life giving sword. Walk softly and carry a big stick comes to mind. Name one country that did not use the will of the people to back up diplomacy. India under Ghandi's leadership did so without a strong military, however, it was the will of the people and the ultimate threat that. However you could argue that this technique worked given that there were unique conditions in place polictically with Britain that enabled this to work. It didn't go so well for Tibet and I have heard the Dali Lama relent his position and decision knowing what he knows today about the suffering his people have incurred.

It boils down to the "lesser evil" in all cases unfortunately. So, IMO, it is always about compromise mostly. Again, what worked for India did not work for Tibet based on the differences in the Diplomatic and Political conditions. Idealism is fine, but at what cost?

"The history of peacemaking far outstrips the history of wars by number and victory. Those who do not see this do not see what Ueshiba was saying either in my opinion. But then again how can many understand such enlightened views when they are not. "

Please explain this further and quantify it, because I really do not understand it. I see it the other way around. the Majority of peacemaking situations have followed periods of war and the war certainly influenced and dictated the terms of peace and reconciliation.

A fair question. Let's start with Aikido being the path of peace. Therefore it uses principles which do so. Thus applied it changes what could have been a fight, a combat, a war into something else.

Now in life just look around you and relate to your own experiences. The truth is there for you to see. How many minor arguments have you seen or had, how many minor disputes have you seen or had? How many times, if you have children, have you settled differences between them. All minor that without settlement would progress into major. So plenty of bigger troubles have always been nipped in the bud, every time this happens it's a victory for peace and common sense. Those unhandled ones turn into war. Then your left with how to handle chaos. That's the last stop.

The principles in Aikido which include for example compassion have been talked about and demonstrated by all enlightened or even just aware people including all those you mentioned, be they Mother Theresa et al. They went out and demonstrated the power of such. Then alas the majority of people don't get it but boy do they talk about it whilst doing the opposite.

For me Ueshiba left a promise in saying what he said. His promise was that these things actually work if you can get them real enough, it's up to you.

Here is a concept to ponder. What if I got a bunch of my friends and we decided to simply walk into your dojo, take it over and refused to leave and cooperate. I decided that I was now in charge and I was going to run things my way or you would have to fight me and all my friends.

Every class we come back and do the same thing to the point that you no longer can train in the ideals and spirit that you embody in Aikido.

What would you do? Turn the other cheek? Stop coming? call the police? what?

What if I don't care to reason with you at all? What if I and my friends simply want to taunt you and bully you every class? do you yield to us and go find another place to train and let us take over the dojo?

What happens if we decide to follow you there and do the same thing? When do you stand your ground? What do you do from an "aikido philosophical/ethical" construct? How do you resolve this?

Ifs and buts, what ifs and yeah buts. Put simply, I would do Aikido. I have faith that Aikido handles violence. Therefore I have faith that a solution is there waiting to be found. Your what ifs above are quite funny. There is no set answer except the one I already gave.

Whichever solution is best. Standing your ground could take many forms for example. It could be teaching you all a lesson, it could be calling the police, it could be leaving and letting you keep taking over like a mischievous zen monk. Who's being led there? I bet a beautiful woman could defeat you and lead you with a smile and a flutter of her eyelids. Gone, mind taken, led.

To see if the priciples I describe can work in extreme situations, (notice I said extreme situations for they are the ones used to try and say they can't) then we would have to look around woildn't we. We would have to look for extreme situations where someone resolved it without force of violence. Have you ever looked for such earnestly? Do such things even make the news? Rarely if ever. Is that because they don't exist?

Non-violent political resistance only works if there is an effective appeal to a third party. Compare the situations of the demonstrators at UC Davis vs. those demonstrating against the regime in Syria. At UC Davis, a police officer pepper-sprayed peaceful demonstrators at point blank range, leading to his own suspension from the force and a university-wide review of protest-related policies. In Syria, demonstrators are routinely subjected to beatings and tear gas, not to mention having the secret police kick their doors down in the middle of the night, but the perpetrators have the full support of the regime. A sufficiently well-armed and amoral regime will always be able to suppress dissent.

Katherine

True, third parties are usually neede in those extreme situations. But let's return to Aikido and violence.

What principles are those third parties using to do so, to prevent violence. What path are those people treading. It's certainly not the art of war. Yet if successful they save many lives.

P.S. The soviet union to my reckoning was sufficiently well armed. It depends on the scale of uprising I suppose. But once again we are talking extreme situations.

Kevin
The most common description I have read is that of saving life or preserving it. Again though it denotes violence.
Kill one (presumably evil) person to save many.
Draeger assigns it (I believe to Otake Sensei) to "Kill one, to save ten thousand."
Take take the drama and Sam-U-eye stuff out of it and the concept applies to your job or any cop walking the beat.
Hope that helps.

Even the idea of love that was bandied about in many earlier cultures people misunderstand. Ueshiba trained assassins. Many times when those guys talked about love it also entailed discipline, sacrifice, or killing to preserve family, village and clan. Aikido's history and it's birth was not through the type of peace some people in Aikido think it means.

This peacnic stuff was nonsensical to them, to most anyone who lives in the real world and nonsense to many in the art of aikido. It is typically offered by those who live, protected by those who will do violence on their behalf; Police, Judges, and the military, so they can live in a civil society. Mankind will always live under peace through strength. In the very few cases were non-violent protest succeeded, it was because those in power capitulated.
Mercy belongs to the victor. Anyone thinking they can stop real aggression- through aikido waza- without aggression is simply kidding themselves. Instead people "play" together nicely in a dojo with their budo get-ups, with attacks deviod of real agression, with defense that hardly needs to be of any real use.
And Aikido is not alone in that.
Dan

Dan, it's good to see your views and thus how we differ. The healing sword, interesting. Thus you teach me how many see it maybe.

I suggest one could look at the word healing.

Mmm, I do wonder when that was that Ueshiba trained assassins. Is that an exagerration or a play on words for no doubt he did train people to kill before the war and no doubt some of them ended up being kamikaze or soldiers or spies or whatever. He says so himself.

But once again I return to Aikido and violence. How aggression fits in with absolute non-resistance I don't know.

I find it amusing for I see aggression like a subconscious mantra repeating over and over 'aggression is necessary, aggression is necessary.' Whatever you do don't take away my aggression. And then we wonder why violence persists?

That's why I love sports. Little aenas where you can play with aggression. Controlled.

That's why I admire warriors of war. People who have to face extreme violence and in such extreme situations not being living buddhas use courage and selflessness to face the enemy and violence as necessary.

Very admirable. But then we come back to AIKIDO. Ahh. The ultimate challenge. A warrior of peace.

To face and overcome violence without violence. To learn on this path the true enemy of self who wants to keep hold of aggression and violence just in case. To face up to the concept of masakatsu and agatsu. To learn how to not, how to but, or how not to.

Thus I say Aikido is a different martial art. The art of peace

Many martial artists may be just arrogant brutes with skill. Many on the other side of martial arts may be softy softy play around let's feel good people.

The real ones on both sides I admire. Oh, and even the real ones in the middle ha, ha.

Love calms, Ki joins leads and heals, Kindness pierces and is never forgotton, faith moves mountains and goodness is the reason we haven't all destroyed ourselves.

All non violent, all powerful. All infinite.

If everyone truly knew this then watching a fight it would be so obvious as to what was missing in those individuals and yet so obvious as to why they couldn't see it.

I agree with the idea that Aikido is non-violent and that violence can not be true aikido.

Central to Osensei's message is the concept in his quote "Aiki is not a technique to fight or defeat an enemy. It is the way to reconcile the world and make human beings one family."

The tendency to use physical aikido principles in furtherance of self-defense is coming from a fear-based place. When we can transcend fear and the limbic system responses that arise from it we are able to connect with our partner (attacker) in a way that supports him while his intention brings him to the ground. This is not throwing, nor is it "winning," it is a process of being compassionately involved in what the attacker is doing physically without interfering with it. It is equally not opposing the will of the attacker, it is the active embodiment of "the loving protection of all things."

In our practice at my dojo, we do not teach from an technique emulation model, so we never know how our partner is going to attack. As ukes we never go along with our partner's "technique" so unless they really harmonize in the truest sense of the word, then what we call an "aiki resolution" (uke coming to rest on the mat or rolling) will not manifest. As ukes, we learn to authentically maintain an attacker's intention to destroy or control nage's center throughout the movement, so any response other than true harmonizing will not result in an aiki resolution.

We have found in this kind of practice that unless we can embody qualities that transcend fear (compassion, forgiveness, acceptance, understanding, etc), we resort to lower brain responses (resistance, locking up, or withdrawal) and aikido is impossible. But when we can embody those qualities and transcend our lower brain responses, it is uke's intention that leads him to the floor rather than nage putting him there.

When we practice like this we allow our uke's to roll, but we also learn at the advanced levels how to stay connected with our partner so that uke's final movement to the mat is soft and he is supported in such a way to eliminate harm to him from contacting the ground. In this way we are assured that our non-aikidoka partners (real life attackers) really receive the benefits of our practice of "loving protection of all things."

So while it is possible to use the movements that make up the physical aspects of aikido in a way that causes injury, pain, or even mild discomfort, it is ultimately a thousand times more effective to use them in a way to support our attacker in the "completion of his mission" as self-defense comes to be more a by-product of the interaction than the primary goal.

Hey Corky. Long time no hear. Good to see you popping in. Still keeping the faith I see ha, ha. A nice surprise. I'll be in touch soon.

The story of Buddha is clear, he entered various ascetic practices. In my view he thought that Aikido would be a perfect vehicle to practice such spiritual disciplines. Maybe similar to the original shaolin concept, but I don't know that for sure.

Regards.G.

What led him to seek out those ascetic practices. That is what I was getting at. What was it that his father attempted to shield him from based on the prophecies?

A fair question. Let's start with Aikido being the path of peace. Therefore it uses principles which do so. Thus applied it changes what could have been a fight, a combat, a war into something else.

Now in life just look around you and relate to your own experiences. The truth is there for you to see. How many minor arguments have you seen or had, how many minor disputes have you seen or had? How many times, if you have children, have you settled differences between them. All minor that without settlement would progress into major. So plenty of bigger troubles have always been nipped in the bud, every time this happens it's a victory for peace and common sense. Those unhandled ones turn into war. Then your left with how to handle chaos. That's the last stop.

The principles in Aikido which include for example compassion have been talked about and demonstrated by all enlightened or even just aware people including all those you mentioned, be they Mother Theresa et al. They went out and demonstrated the power of such. Then alas the majority of people don't get it but boy do they talk about it whilst doing the opposite.

For me Ueshiba left a promise in saying what he said. His promise was that these things actually work if you can get them real enough, it's up to you.

Such is my view, open to debate of course.

Regards.G.

I think you are missing my point about the people of greatness. What they all had in common was they faced great suffering. They were in the bowels of great suffering, evil, or darkness and faced it head on. Those conditions led to their greatness.

It was more than an emotional argument between Co workers or siblings, or even a ego driven bar fight. It was long term, deeply rooted suffering that extended beyond the temporary emotion of a particular event.

I believe the original question was is violence necessary or a part of Aikido. I say it is a must to face, and deal with violence at some level in order to give Aikido its purpose or relevancy. We cannot use revisionism and rewrite history and attempt to recolor it into something we desire it to be. When we accept the path of a budoka, we accept the path that directly deals with violence. There are other paths such as becoming a nun for instance that might be better suited for people that do not desire to deal with the path of violence. However all these practices deal with suffering in some way be it violence, poverty, hatred, sickness, old age etc.

Here is a concept to ponder. What if I got a bunch of my friends and we decided to simply walk into your dojo, take it over and refused to leave and cooperate. I decided that I was now in charge and I was going to run things my way or you would have to fight me and all my friends.

Every class we come back and do the same thing to the point that you no longer can train in the ideals and spirit that you embody in Aikido.

What would you do? Turn the other cheek? Stop coming? call the police? what?

What if I don't care to reason with you at all? What if I and my friends simply want to taunt you and bully you every class? do you yield to us and go find another place to train and let us take over the dojo?

What happens if we decide to follow you there and do the same thing? When do you stand your ground? What do you do from an "aikido philosophical/ethical" construct? How do you resolve this?

The problem with any hypothetical is that it never can ever possibly cover the scope of a real situation. The beauty of take musu aiki is that it spontaneously manifests without technique. There is no answer to your question that would not be based in the same conjecture in which it was pose, and is therefore in the realm of "the map" and not "the territory." Also, to answer the question in a way to satisfy the nature of its asking is to come up with a solution in which the bullies lose and the aikidoka win and get to keep practicing.

Deep in the heart of this question is that longing to win, to overcome, to defeat the "invading bullies." Therefore even to engage in such a discussion is to ignore the principle of the founder described in this quote: "If you think that Budo means to have opponents and enemies and to be strong and defeat them, you are mistaken. The true spirit of the martial arts is to be one with the universe and have no enemies. The essence of the martial arts is the spirit of loving protection of all beings in the universe."

An understanding of this needs to be cultivated. It doesn't necessarily appear to be true to the ordinary way of looking at things, which is why there are many fewer aikidoka in the world than practitioners of admittedly destructive martial arts.

There is no way to prove that moral conviction is the most powerful response to injustice, it has to come to be understood. There are no answers to the posed question until they present themselves at the time when the idea to attack arises in the minds of the "dojo bullies." At that time, at the moment the attack rises so does the solution.

Kevin
The most common description I have read is that of saving life or preserving it. Again though it denotes violence.
Kill one (presumably evil) person to save many.
Draeger assigns it (I believe to Otake Sensei) to "Kill one, to save ten thousand."
Take take the drama and Sam-U-eye stuff out of it and the concept applies to your job or any cop walking the beat.
Hope that helps.

Even the idea of love that was bandied about in many earlier cultures people misunderstand. Ueshiba trained assassins. Many times when those guys talked about love it also entailed discipline, sacrifice, or killing to preserve family, village and clan. Aikido's history and it's birth was not through the type of peace some people in Aikido think it means.

This peacnic stuff was nonsensical to them, to most anyone who lives in the real world and nonsense to many in the art of aikido. It is typically offered by those who live, protected by those who will do violence on their behalf; Police, Judges, and the military, so they can live in a civil society. Mankind will always live under peace through strength. In the very few cases were non-violent protest succeeded, it was because those in power capitulated.
Mercy belongs to the victor. Anyone thinking they can stop real aggression- through aikido waza- without aggression is simply kidding themselves. Instead people "play" together nicely in a dojo with their budo get-ups, with attacks deviod of real agression, with defense that hardly needs to be of any real use.
And Aikido is not alone in that.
Dan

Thanks Dan. I knew the answer of course. I was hoping that the person that proposed this concept of the sword of healing would define it for me. I like you, understood the sword of life or the life giving sword to be a wielder that possessed the power, skill, and willingness to use it directly, but used it more skillfully to create space, room, and time in order to allow for more skillfull ways of reconciliation and healing to take place. Of course this comes with a risk. You might actually have to use it on occasion if you are really putting yourself out there.you know...in real situations that are authentic, risky, and real.

Can you cross interpret this to the corporate board room? I suppose you could as it certainly makes for a great allegory. Just like sun tzu was in the 80s. However I don,t think it is a good use of your time to spend hours learning physical techniques and training hard in something like Aikido only so you can understand a metaphor.

Heck with all the books, websites, and YouTube videos that are out there you simply can understand these concepts without having to go into the dojo.

The problem with any hypothetical is that it never can ever possibly cover the scope of a real situation. The beauty of take musu aiki is that it spontaneously manifests without technique. There is no answer to your question that would not be based in the same conjecture in which it was pose, and is therefore in the realm of "the map" and not "the territory." Also, to answer the question in a way to satisfy the nature of its asking is to come up with a solution in which the bullies lose and the aikidoka win and get to keep practicing.

Deep in the heart of this question is that longing to win, to overcome, to defeat the "invading bullies." Therefore even to engage in such a discussion is to ignore the principle of the founder described in this quote: "If you think that Budo means to have opponents and enemies and to be strong and defeat them, you are mistaken. The true spirit of the martial arts is to be one with the universe and have no enemies. The essence of the martial arts is the spirit of loving protection of all beings in the universe."

An understanding of this needs to be cultivated. It doesn't necessarily appear to be true to the ordinary way of looking at things, which is why there are many fewer aikidoka in the world than practitioners of admittedly destructive martial arts.

There is no way to prove that moral conviction is the most powerful response to injustice, it has to come to be understood. There are no answers to the posed question until they present themselves at the time when the idea to attack arises in the minds of the "dojo bullies." At that time, at the moment the attack rises so does the solution.

Thanks for the well thought out answer.

Agreed. At the moment of time, so does the solution.

However, of course I was driving at the hypocracy that is always present and that we all choose to ignore, but shouldn,t. I think we all, or at least most of us have a point when we say ENOUGH!

I find it very hyporactic to say that the AIKI solution is to always reason and show the bulliesanother way...and we will all join hands and walk on the path.

I agree with the philosophy of love for all beings and loving protection. However it doesn't,t come simply because we decide one day to join an Aikido dojo and then say that I follow the path and the profess a degree of evolvement that we mentally can process, yet have not explored to any great depth emotionally, physically, or spiritually. I see this all the time in aikidoka.

No, it require us to face stuff we don,t like, things that we are uncomfortable with, and have our buttons pushed. Pushed to the point that we snap and say enough. So we can recognize the hypocracy in ourselves and learn to deal with it. We must first take care of our own issues before we can take on others.

So i agree. There is no answer to the question thatoffers a good cut and dry solution from a fundamental, black and white aiki-dogmatic process.

However it is our duy to ponder such questions and attempt to answer. Fuuny thing is once you've boxed yourself into that corner of hypocracy saying Aikido is all about resolving situations peacefully, it is hard to come back and answer this question without exposing your own hypocracy, which is why it has only been answered most likely by you. Thanks for the response.

The story of Buddha is clear. How did he reach his enlightenment? what was the main force that drove him to head down the path?

The main force that drove him was a realization of suffering, and the core of his teachings was an understanding of the nature of suffering. "Enlightenment" in the Buddhist tradition may or may not bear any resemblance to whatever Ueshiba called "enlightenment". The term is commonly bandied about in the west and used for different things. I don't think there's necessarily any commonality there.

Whichever solution is best. Standing your ground could take many forms for example. It could be teaching you all a lesson, it could be calling the police, it could be leaving and letting you keep taking over like a mischievous zen monk. Who's being led there?

Call the police on someone who won't move?
Very 'aiki':

'Letting' someone do exactly what they want is not leading them; you are having no impact on that person, whatsoever.
"Yeah - you're killing all of those Jewish people, Adolf, but I tell you what i'm gonna do: i'm gonna leave and let you keep doing it, like a mischievous zen monk, lol."

The main force that drove him was a realization of suffering, and the core of his teachings was an understanding of the nature of suffering. "Enlightenment" in the Buddhist tradition may or may not bear any resemblance to whatever Ueshiba called "enlightenment". The term is commonly bandied about in the west and used for different things. I don't think there's necessarily any commonality there.

So are you saying that there is a difference between the Buddhist view of enlightenment and Ueshiba?

I think you are missing my point about the people of greatness. What they all had in common was they faced great suffering. They were in the bowels of great suffering, evil, or darkness and faced it head on. Those conditions led to their greatness.

It was more than an emotional argument between Co workers or siblings, or even a ego driven bar fight. It was long term, deeply rooted suffering that extended beyond the temporary emotion of a particular event.

I believe the original question was is violence necessary or a part of Aikido. I say it is a must to face, and deal with violence at some level in order to give Aikido its purpose or relevancy. We cannot use revisionism and rewrite history and attempt to recolor it into something we desire it to be. When we accept the path of a budoka, we accept the path that directly deals with violence. There are other paths such as becoming a nun for instance that might be better suited for people that do not desire to deal with the path of violence. However all these practices deal with suffering in some way be it violence, poverty, hatred, sickness, old age etc.

I agree it's a must to face violence. That doesn't mean it's a must to use violence. Aikido points to a way of such.

All the people you mention? I don't think so. Yes, they all used their awareness and ability to try to handle and help the suffering which they could see clearly for they were compassionate. But trying to say they came from it, or were in such extreme situations in the first place is simply way off the mark.

Let's take Buddha for example. He came from luxury. To be compassionate has no bearing on where your from or what situations you have to face.

What led him to seek out those ascetic practices. That is what I was getting at. What was it that his father attempted to shield him from based on the prophecies?

I'd say forget all that nonsense about father and this or that. Use common sense instead. Ask the question what makes anyone search out truth and thus enter ascetic practices and spiritual disciplines. Seeing life don't make sense that's what. Seeing it don't make sense and wondering what it's all about and why they are here.

Different circumstances in life can lead to a person doing this but no one can make them. It's always personal.

'Letting' someone do exactly what they want is not leading them; you are having no impact on that person, whatsoever.
"Yeah - you're killing all of those Jewish people, Adolf, but I tell you what i'm gonna do: i'm gonna leave and let you keep doing it, like a mischievous zen monk, lol."

Ha, ha. Calling the police would be on those trying to take over not on the person not moving. Duhhh.

Letting someone complete their mission is a principle in Aikido but alas some like you think it means what you see it as and thus lack the reality of what it means. Unfortunate.

Comparing extreme killing situations with leading a group of idiots from one place is not comparable. lol.

Thanks Dan. I knew the answer of course. I was hoping that the person that proposed this concept of the sword of healing would define it for me. I like you, understood the sword of life or the life giving sword to be a wielder that possessed the power, skill, and willingness to use it directly, but used it more skillfully to create space, room, and time in order to allow for more skillfull ways of reconciliation and healing to take place. Of course this comes with a risk. You might actually have to use it on occasion if you are really putting yourself out there.you know...in real situations that are authentic, risky, and real.

Can you cross interpret this to the corporate board room? I suppose you could as it certainly makes for a great allegory. Just like sun tzu was in the 80s. However I don,t think it is a good use of your time to spend hours learning physical techniques and training hard in something like Aikido only so you can understand a metaphor.

Heck with all the books, websites, and YouTube videos that are out there you simply can understand these concepts without having to go into the dojo.

Sounds like a space and time giving sword to me. However, a nice logical, construct. You best stick to that one. It suits your parameters.

The main force that drove him was a realization of suffering, and the core of his teachings was an understanding of the nature of suffering. "Enlightenment" in the Buddhist tradition may or may not bear any resemblance to whatever Ueshiba called "enlightenment". The term is commonly bandied about in the west and used for different things. I don't think there's necessarily any commonality there.

True, as in the four noble 'truths'. He then went on to give a basic construct, a way, to prevent it. Thus the eightfold path.

Notice there was no violence in his perceived ways of progress. Notice also that historically that particular religion spread across most of Asia and beyond, at least a third of the world of that time by in a slightly different way to many religions. Without violence yet with a great effect which brought people together and things got more civilized.

But alas then along comes human crazyness and greed etc. and gradually the morals once again decline and suffering follows. Same old cycle.

Then the suffereing can only see violence as the answer as usual and we're back to the game of suffering using violence and the 'protectors of them using violence and this leads to more suffering and blame and calls for revenge and......

A spiral, alas one that goes down and yet the purveyors of it are all logical and right. Oh, and of course let's not forget admirers of violence just in case you understand.

Thank God for Aikido and a glimpse that there could be a better way of doing things.

Just like the old man on the train handling the violent drunk whist the Aikidoka who was ready to attack him got off the train realizing he had yet a lot to learn.

Ever watched a hawk catch a smaller bird? A cat hunting a mouse? More natural than most things humans do, if you ask me.

As for violence in human societies, there's much less of it now than there used to be. But the web provides lots of evidence that "civilization" requires an enforcement mechanism. Without one, it only takes a few people to create chaos.